Under a Charm Volume Iii Part 5

Leo sprang up, and stood before her with flashing eyes. "And you have suffered this, mother; you have stood by looking on while my love, my rights, were being trampled under foot--you who can control, can command obedience from every one! Has this Waldemar subdued you too? Is there no one left who dares oppose him? Fool that I was to allow myself to be talked out of calling him to account before I left, to be dissuaded from taking Wanda away to a distance where no further meeting between them would have been possible! But"--speaking now in a tone of bitter sarcasm--"but my suspicion was an insult to her, and my uncle accounted my 'blind jealousy' as a crime. Can you see now with your own eyes? Whilst I was fighting to the death for my country's freedom and salvation, my betrothed was risking her life for the man who openly declares himself on the side of our oppressors, who has set his foot on our necks here in Wilicza, just as the tyrants out yonder have tried to crush our kindred and friends. She betrays me, forgets her country, people, family, all, that she may shield him in a moment of peril.

Perhaps she will try to protect him from me; but she had better beware.

I care nothing now which of us perishes, whether it be he or I, or she with us both."

The Princess seized his hands, as though imploring him to restrain his fury. "Be calm, Leo; I entreat, I require it of you. You shall not rush to meet your brother in this spirit of fierce hatred. Listen to me first."

Leo tore himself free. "I have listened to too much. I have heard enough to make me mad. Wanda threw herself into his arms when Osiecki levelled his rifle at him, screened him with her own body, made her breast his shield--and I am still to hesitate to speak of treachery!

Where is Waldemar? Not so hidden but he can be discovered, I suppose?"

His mother tried in vain to soothe her darling; he did not listen to her, and while she was considering how, in what manner, it might yet be possible to avert that fatal meeting, the worst befell, which at that moment well could have befallen. Waldemar came back.

He entered with a rapid step, and was going up to the Princess, when he caught sight of Leo. More than surprise, horror and alarm were portrayed on the elder brother's face at the sight. He turned very pale, and measured the younger man from head to foot; then his eye flashed as though with scorn and anger, and he said slowly--

"So this is where you are to be found!"

Leo's countenance betrayed a sort of savage satisfaction on seeing the object of his hate before him. "You did not expect to see me?" he asked.

Waldemar made no reply. His more prudent and reflective mind at once took in the thought of the danger to which Leo was here exposing himself. He turned, went into the next room and closed the door, and then came back to them.

"No," he replied, only now answering the question, "and your mother hardly expected it either."

"I wanted to congratulate you on your heroic deed at the border-station, for you probably look on it in the light of an exploit," went on the young Prince, with undisguised scorn. "You shot down the ranger, and showed a bold front to the rest of the band, I hear. The dastards did not dare to touch you."

"They crossed the frontier the same night," said Waldemar, "to join you, probably."

"Yes."

"I thought so. When did you leave your post?"

"Are you going to put me on my trial?" exclaimed Leo. "I am here to call you to account. Come, we have some matters to talk over together."

"Stay," commanded the Princess. "You shall not meet alone. If an explanation is inevitable, I will be present at it. Perhaps you will then not altogether forget that you are brothers."

"Brother or not, he has been guilty of the most shameful treachery towards me. He knew that Wanda was engaged to me, and he did not hesitate to decoy her and her love from me. It was the act of a traitor, of a co ..."

His mother tried to stop him, but in vain. The word 'coward' fell from his lips, and Waldemar started as though a ball had struck him. The Princess grew ashy pale. It was not the frenzied pa.s.sion of her younger son which so alarmed her, but the expression on the face of the elder as he drew himself erect. It was Waldemar she held back, Waldemar she feared, though he was unarmed, while Leo wore his sword at his side.

Stepping between them with all a mother's authority, she called to them imperatively--

"Waldemar! Leo! control yourselves, I command you."

When the Princess Baratowska issued a command in such a tone and such a manner, she never failed to obtain a hearing. Even at this crisis her sons, almost involuntarily, obeyed her behest. Leo let fall the hand he had already raised to his sword-hilt, and Nordeck paused. The struggle in the strong man against his old furious violence was terrible to behold; but his mother's words had caused him to reflect a moment, and more was not wanting now to recall him to himself.

"Leo, there have been insults enough," he said, hoa.r.s.ely. "One word, one single word more, and there will indeed be nothing left us but an appeal to arms. If yesterday you still had the right to accuse me, you have forfeited that right to-day. I love Wanda more than you can dream of; for you have not, as I have, fought for years against this pa.s.sion--have not borne aversion, separation, mortal peril, only, after all, to attain to a conviction that love is stronger than you. But, even for Wanda's sake, I would not have given up duty and honour, would not have deserted my appointed post, would not secretly have abandoned the troops entrusted to me, and broken the oath of obedience I had sworn to my leader. All this you have done. Our mother shall decide which of us deserves the ignominious word you have flung at me."

"What is this, Leo?" cried the Princess, startled, a great fear taking possession of her. "You are here with your uncle's knowledge and consent? You had express leave from him to come to Wilicza? Answer me!"

A crimson flush dyed the young Prince's face, which up to this time had been so pale. He did not venture to meet his mother's eye, but turned upon Waldemar with sudden and furious defiance.

"What do you know of my duty? What matter is it to you? You are on the side of our enemies. I have stood my ground so far without flinching, and I shall be forthcoming when I am wanted; for that very reason, this matter between us must be quickly settled. I have not much time in which to reckon with you. I must go back to my men to-day, in the course of an hour or two."

"You will arrive too late," said Waldemar, coldly. "You will not find them."

Leo evidently did not grasp the meaning of the words he heard. He stared at his brother, as though the latter had been speaking in some foreign tongue.

"How long have you been absent from your command?" asked Waldemar again, this time with such terrible earnest that Leo half involuntarily made answer--

"Since yesterday evening."

"A surprise took place during the night. Your troops are routed, dispersed."

A cry broke from the young Prince's lips. He rushed up to the speaker.

"It is impossible--it cannot be! You lie--you wish to scare me, to drive me away."

"No, it cannot be," said the Princess, with quivering lips. "You cannot have news of what happened out yonder during the night, Waldemar. I should have heard it before you. You are deceiving us; do not resort to such means."

Waldemar looked at his mother in silence for a few seconds--at the mother who preferred to accuse him of a lie than to believe in an error of his brother's. Perhaps it was this which made him so icy and pitiless, as he went on.

"An important post was confided to Prince Baratowski, with strict orders not to stir from it. He and his troops covered his uncle's rear.

Prince Baratowski was absent from his post when the night attack was made--successfully. The leader was absent, and those who remained behind showed themselves unequal to their task. Taken by surprise, they offered but a weak resistance, totally without plan or method. A terrible slaughter followed. About twenty men took refuge on this territory, and fell into the hands of our patrols. Three of the fugitives lie, grievously wounded, over at the manor-farm. From their mouths I learned what had happened. All the rest are dispersed or destroyed."

"And my brother?" asked the Princess, calm, to all appearance, but with an awful, unnatural calm. "And the Morynski corps? What has become of them?"

"I do not know," replied Waldemar. "It is said that the victors advanced on W----. No news has reached us of what has taken place there."

He was silent. There was a pause of terrible stillness. Leo had hidden his face in his hands; a deep groan escaped his breast. The Princess stood erect, her eyes steadily fixed on him. She panted for breath.

"Leave us, Waldemar," said she at last.

He hesitated. His mother had always shown herself cold, often enough hostile to him. Here, on this very spot, she had confronted him as a bitter enemy at the time when the contest for supremacy at Wilicza had brought about an open rupture; but he had never yet seen her as she appeared at this moment, and he, this hard, relentless Nordeck, was seized with a feeling akin to anxiety and compa.s.sion, as he read his brother's doom in her face.

"Mother!" he said, in a low tone.

"Go," she repeated. "I have to talk with Prince Baratowski. No third person can come between us. Leave us alone."

Waldemar obeyed and left the room, but his heart swelled within him as he went. He was banished in order that the mother might talk to her son. If she were now about to let that son feel her anger, as she had so often testified to him her affection, he, the elder, was still a stranger, as he had ever been. He was told to go; he could not 'come between' his mother and brother, whether they met in love or hate. A great bitterness took possession of Nordeck's soul, and yet he felt that in this hour he was avenged--that his mother, who had ever denied to him her love, was punished now in her tenderest point, punished through her darling, the child she had idolised.

Waldemar closed the curtains behind him. He remained in the next room, so as to guard the entrance, come what might, for he was fully sensible of the danger to which Leo was exposed. Prince Baratowski had taken too open and decided a part in the insurrection not to be placed under a ban, even on this side the frontier; even here condemnation and imprisonment awaited him. He had imprudently come up to the Castle in broad daylight. The troop, which had escorted the wounded men, was still in the village, and at any moment a detachment, convoying the other fugitives to L----, might pa.s.s through Wilicza. It was necessary to take some precautionary measures.

Waldemar stood at the window, as far from the door as possible. He would hear nothing of the interview from which he had been shut out--and, indeed, it was impossible for any sound to penetrate the heavy velvet folds of the thick portieres. But time pressed. More than half an hour had elapsed, and the two were still closeted together.

Neither the Princess nor Leo seemed mindful of the fact that the latter's danger grew with every minute. Waldemar, at length, resolved to interrupt them. He went back into the drawing-room; but paused with astonishment on entering, for instead of the agitating scene he had expected to witness, he found the most absolute silence. The Princess had disappeared, and the door of her study, which had previously stood open, was now closed. Leo was alone in the room. He lay back in an armchair, his head buried in the cushions, and neither stirred nor in any way noticed his brother's appearance. He seemed utterly crushed and broken. Waldemar went up to him, and spoke his name.

"Rouse yourself," he said, in a low, urgent tone. "Take some thought for your safety. We are now connected with L---- in a hundred ways. I cannot secure the Castle from visits which would be dangerous for you.

Retire to your own rooms in the first instance. They will be thought empty and closed as heretofore, and Pawlick is trustworthy. Come."

Slowly Leo raised his head. Every drop of blood had receded from his face; it was grey with an ashy pallor. He fixed his large, vacant eyes on his brother, seeming not to understand him, but his ear caught the last word mechanically.

"Come where?" he asked.

"Away, in the first place, from these reception-rooms, which are accessible to so many. Come, I beg of you."